Mastectomy Summary

In the mid 1990s, Alicia Ostriker was diagnosed with breast cancer. She expressed her feelings about this traumatic experience, which resulted in a mastectomy and a long, painful recovery, in her collection of poems, The Crack in Everything. When it was published in 1996, the book confirmed her reputation as one of America’s finest poets. The fourth section of the collection, titled “The Mastectomy Poems,” deals directly with her response...

Alicia Ostriker Biographies (1)

Like several women poets in her generation, including Sandra Gilbert, Adrienne Rich, Audre Lorde, and Alice Walker, Alicia Ostriker also writes as a literary critic. Clear and lyrical, her poetry comb...
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